“The idea came about last year when I was at Art Basel
with friends and a lot of them really didn’t understand
contemporary art,” Loweth, 55, said. “If you could meet the
artists, then you could have a personal connection to the
piece.”

On display were Henry Richardson’s chiseled colored-glass
sculptures, Domingo Zapata’s graffiti-like paintings and human-head forms by Richard Dupont. Loweth encouraged guests to talk
with the artists about their work.

“If you look at sports, or most anything, there are
sponsors -- coaches or agents -- who help talented athletes
along their way,” Loweth said.

Loweth declined to say what he’s up to business-wise. He
did not take a commission on the several pieces that sold.

“I’m not a gallery, I’m not getting paid,” he said.
“Obviously I collect their art, so if their art goes up in
value I’m not not getting something.”

“I have a lot of 19th-century, French, classic paintings
in my home,” said Glenn Mierendorf, portfolio manager at
Lincoln Capital LLC and a former colleague of Loweth’s at
Diamondback Capital. “Eventually you want to make a switch and
go contemporary.”

Balanchine Junkie

Jared Angle, a principal dancer with New York City Ballet,
made a charming host at Guild Hall in East Hampton.

Wearing a T-shirt, parachute pants and black ballet
slippers, Angle talked the audience through choreography by City
Ballet founder George Balanchine.

“I live in the world of a genius,” Angle, 32, said. “I’m
a full-fledged Balanchine junkie.”

Members of the company performed excerpts from Balanchine’s
“Agon” and “Apollo,” as well as current ballet-master-in-chief Peter Martins’s version of “Swan Lake” based on Marius
Petipa’s 1895 story ballet.

With earlier choreographers, Angle said, “You’re dancing
on top of the music, it’s so even. With Balanchine, you’re
inside the music.”

Small Stage

“I love this, it’s so intimate and personal,” interior
designer Charlotte Moss said at the end of the Aug. 16 program.

It was the company’s first performance on Guild Hall’s
stage, which is perilously small for dance.

“We’re trying to find a model so we can travel to places
like this,” said Kathy Brown, executive director of New York
City Ballet.

“The goal always is to get people to come to Lincoln
Center,” said board member Barbara Slifka. The visit included
workshops with local budding ballerinas.

New York City Ballet begins its next season at Lincoln
Center’s David H. Koch Theater on Sept. 17.

(Nathaniel E. Baker is the editor of Bloomberg Brief: Hedge
Funds, a publication of Bloomberg LP. Amanda Gordon is a writer
and photographer for Muse, the arts and leisure section of
Bloomberg News. Any opinions expressed are their own.)